David Harlow's Health Care Law Blog

February 12, 2008

Grand Rounds Vol. 4 No. 21: The Valentine's Day Edition

Happy Valentine's Day (almost), and welcome to Grand Rounds, "the weekly rotating carnival of the best of the medical blogosphere," hosted improbably this week by -- horrors! -- a health care lawyer and consultant. I've organized this edition around themes related to Valentine's Day, which is coming up real soon, on February 14. (Last call for those of you who still haven't figured out what you're doing for that special someone.) If this is your first visit to HealthBlawg, I hope you'll stick around and read a few posts beyond today's edition of Grand Rounds, and maybe even come back now and again.

Thanks to all of the medbloggers out there who submitted posts that stuck with the previously-announced categories. High honors go to two bloggers for going above and beyond (details below).

The popular customs associated with Saint Valentine's Day undoubtedly had their origin in a conventional belief generally received in England and France during the Middle Ages, that on 14 February, i.e. half way through the second month of the year, the birds began to pair. Thus in Chaucer's Parliament of Foules we read:

For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne's day Whan every foul cometh ther to choose his mate.

For this reason the day was looked upon as specially consecrated to lovers and as a proper occasion for writing love letters and sending lovers' tokens.

So let's begin with posts touching on birds and love.

A couple of lovebirds dealing with each other's illnesses is the topic of Barbara Kivowitz's post at In Sickness and In Health;
hers is chronic, his is a new cardiovascular issue. An interesting
look at the sick role, the caregiver role, and changing roles in a
long-term relationship.

How often do you see "folie a deux" and "Q-Tip" in the same post? Tip of the hat to Liana at Med Valley High for this tale of two strange birds. (Would someone kindly page Oliver Sacks?)

Dr. Anonymous is blogging about "the love hormone" and will have a Valentine's Day edition of his BlogTalkRadio show -- which Dr. Val tells us will be an "estrofest" featuring several women medbloggers.

We're not supposed to throw rice at weddings anymore -- to save the birds, you know -- but this week Christine Miserandino at But You Don't Look Sick tells us love can be a rice ball.

Matters of the heart

Since the heart was long thought to be the seat of emotion, and Valentine's Day is associated with matters of the heart, this segment of Grand Rounds is open season on anything cardiovascular.

David Williams introduces us to iCardiac Technologies at his Health Business Blog. Among other things, this company is working on personalized medicine, so that drugs with risks for some can be marketed to others, rather than being kept off the market.

Two of my personal favorite approaches to ensuring cardiovascular health have gotten a ringing endorsement from Danish researchers: drinking (in moderation, of course) and exercising. Clinical Cases and Images points to the study(as does Time magazine). My poisons of choice: red wine, single-malt scotch and bicycling. (For more on the latter, see my posts on biking in the Pan-Mass Challenge, and consider sponsoring me this year. The poison of choice for many of my fellow-riders seems to be beer; for the carbs, they say.)

Now if we look back a little further through the mists of time, we'll find that there may have been three different saints named Valentine, but they had to buddy up on one saint's day. Trusty Wikipedia tells us:

The saint's feast day was removed from the Church calendar in 1969 as part of a broader effort to remove saints viewed by some as being of purely legendary origin. . . . Prior to the creation of the new calendar, the church in Rome that had been dedicated to him observed his feast day by, among other things, displaying his reputed skull surrounded by roses.

Could our saint be the ur-Deadhead? I don't know . . . . In any event, we now turn to posts of skulls and roses.

In the numbskull category, we have Amy Tenderich's explication of the ACCORD study results -- and the inability of the mainstream media to get it right -- over at Diabetes Mine. (Amy was kinder, labeling the post cardiovascular.) For a more personal reaction to the ACCORD news, see Rachel Baumgartel's Tales of My Thirties.

Speaking of orthopedic surgery, Bongi shares a tale of a leg amputation and a (relatively brief) discussion of same with a student rugby player visiting the OR, at Other Things Amanzi. He titled this post Callous.

For a post on Rose, we turn to Running a Hospital and Paul Levy's appreciation of a long-term volunteer named Rose, and ruminations on the folks each of us looks to as a moral compass.

Lupercalia

Peering even further back to an earlier age, we see that Valentine's Day is one of those Church festivals intended to replace an earlier pagan festival. (Religious groups through the ages have tried to claim sacred space and time from other religious groups, sometimes more peacefully than others). Lupercalia was a pagan festival honoring the she-wolf that suckled Romulus and Remus, mythic founders of Rome. The main event involved Luperci, or "the brothers of the wolf," clad only in goatskins, sacrificing goats and a dog, smearing blood on foreheads and running about whipping girls and young women with goatskin thongs to ensure their fertility.

Thanks to the Luperci, we can now delve into recent posts touching upon goats, wolves, dermatology, hematology and fertility.

On hematology and, well, the skull again: At the
intersection of the base of the skull and the circulatory system, it's
time for another look at chiropractic and cervical artery dissection. Walter at Highlight HEALTH
lets us know that the latest study says it's really not a problem,
though folks with other risk factors for dissection should probably
avoid chiropractic. (On a personal note: I'm entirely open to complementary therapies, including chiropractic and acupuncture, both of which have worked for me.)

Anyone who's tracked animals can tell you about scat. Beth at PixelRN shares her own scatological obsession -- an occupational hazard, one might say. (I indulged my younger son's interest in that department last weekend, as we mucked goat stalls at a local model farm. If that ain't love . . . .)

Straying away from the vulpine: One day, the phrase "kill the skunk" will be synonymous with "do the right thing," and you'll be able to say you remember the day you read Sam Solomon's seminal medical ethics skunk post at Canadian Medicine.

And finally, here's Jolie Bookspan's unusual Valentine's Day tip. Forget dancing with wolves; The Fitness Fixer says: do push-ups with a friend.

Well, even if the immortal bard didn't have us in mind while penning those words, we've come to the end of another edition of Grand Rounds. Thanks for visiting HealthBlawg, and I look forward to having you drop by now and then. (You can leave the goatskin home, though.) Thanks to Nick Genes and thanks again to all the medbloggers who contributed.

Next week's Grand Rounds will be hosted at DailyInterview. See you there.

» David Harlow's Grand Rounds Gets To the Heart of the Matter from Trusted.MD Network
Congrats to fellow health law blogger, David Harlow at HealthBlawg who does a wonderful job weaving together a special Valentine's Day edition of Grand Rounds. David's edition gets to the heart of the matter and includes a wide range of posts - covering t [Read More]

» Grand Rounds: (Almost) Valentine's Day edition from InsureBlog
In a nod to history, health care lawyer and consultant David Harlow presents this week's Grand Rounds as a sort of "Valentine's Day through the ages." It's a great effort, with almost 3 dozen roses, er, entries. [Read More]

Tracked on February 12, 2008 at 12:14 PM

» ScienceDebate2008 and blog carnivals from Trusted.MD Network
The movement to have US presidential candidates discuss Science and Technology in a devoted debate has been picking up steam. Date and place are scheduled: April 18th at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.
- cosponsored by the AAAS, the Council on Co [Read More]

» Putting the “Heart” in Grand Rounds from Trusted.MD Network
I’ve been a bad blogger.
I have neglected linkage duties for a week!
So without further ado, David at HealthBlawg is hosting this week’s Grand Rounds. The theme? Valentine’s Day!
Hence this photo from Cookies by Design.
I want this for Valentines [Read More]

Tracked on February 12, 2008 at 03:50 PM

» Grand Rounds is Up at HealthBlawg from Trusted.MD Network
David Harlow's excellent health care law blog (Healthblawg) is hosting this week's Grand Rounds which focuses on, what else, Valentine's Day themes. Have a look. My post on Palpitations is included. Thanks David. [Read More]

Tracked on February 13, 2008 at 03:10 AM

» Carnivalia and an open thread from Pharyngula
Carnivals! Carnival of Education #156 A belated Carnival of the Liberals #57 Carnival of the Liberals #58 Grand Rounds Friday Ark #178 The Boneyard #13 Oekologie #14 A Tangled Bank announcement! The next Tangled Bank will be at Greg Laden's... [Read More]

Tracked on February 16, 2008 at 07:17 PM

Comments

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GREAT job!! Thanks for including my essay and link. I can honestly say that I enjoyed this Grand Rounds so much-- I think this might be one of the best week's yet! Thanks for all the hard work!